Whoa, who knew Liam Neeson was such a hard ass, but then his parental tendency to kick ass and take names when his daughter is kidnapped is never an element that distracts viewers with the believability, mainly because it’s Liam Neeson, a man in his fifties who struts around the film as the hero who is a change of pace from young male models and wrestlers who normally dominating the big screen. Neeson is an antidote to all the barely past puberty action pukes and convinces us that he’ll kill anyone and everyone if you take from him. It’s a true testament that Neeson simply knocks this role out of the park.
Tag Archives: Suspense
Let the Right One In (Låt den rätte komma in) (2008)
There really isn’t much of anything directors can do with the vampire sub-genre anymore and that’s been a given for horror geeks for a long time. I’m repellent to any and all vampire fang films that come to the forefront and I’ve made it a rule to carefully dissect most fang films after constant turkeys passed my way. Thankfully “Let the Right One In” isn’t your average vampire movie. And while it’s trite to make such a declaration the truth remains: “Let the Right One In” is a different vampire film and one I loved with every aching horror geek bone inside me.
Midnight Meat Train (2008)
I hate the subways, I’ve always hated the subways; they’re dark, dank, merciless and filled with running machines that you can’t control thus you are immediately trapped if you find yourself on the wrong pod in the middle of the night. What if it stops mid tunnel? Will it go? Will it ever keep running? How far does the rabbit hole go, and what’s in these holes we’ve never explored? That’s the questions posed in “Midnight Meat Train,” Ryuhei Kitamura’s tale of a subway serial killer that have been somewhat of an anomaly in the horror world. It’s one that many have desired to see but few have been able to, and I’m glad to say that it’s well worth the wait many of us are enduring that may go on for another year or so. Who knows when the masses will be able to see it, if at all?
The Stepford Wives (1975)
An “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” for the feminist era, novelist Ira Levin’s horror science fiction thriller is an ode to the fear of feminism, the unwelcome reception it received by old fashioned men who grew up in a society predominantly ruled by subservient women and a bit of a paranoid fantasy that takes the best of feminism and matches it with the male ego that ultimately attempts to snuff out the girl power movement enacted by women after the sixties and take it in to an era where women were soon relegated to tools and props as status symbols for men unwilling to submit to a woman who was well spoken, intelligent, and always anxious to give their men hell for making decisions that they didn’t approve with. Sure it’s an anti-male diatribe, but so what? “The Stepford Wives” original as directed by Bryan Forbes is a reflection on a society that wants to have it both ways.
Paranormal Activity (2007)
In the days of overexposed, computer heavy FX extravaganzas, horror films that go for a more subtle build of terror are usually dismissed as cheap throwaways that just don’t have the budget to compete with the big studio thrill rides. It’s no secret that the “less is more” philosophy is the independent filmmaker’s best friend, but occasionally there comes along a movie that embraces its sense of mystery and uses a building sense of menace to its advantage.
The Happening (2008) (DVD)
People say that M. Night Shyamlan is the David Blaine of filmmaking, a man with parlor tricks and elaborate illusions of creativity and imagination but I dismiss those claims and still stand by M. Night proclaiming him one of the better storytellers of modern film. Sure, there could be other horror films out there, but in a year generally devoid of horror only with remakes and quasi-horror in theaters and on home video I say that M. Night’s dabbling in the R rated arena was an utter win.
Adam's Jacket (2008)
I do admire what director David Morgan goes for with a short black comedy about a small prank that leads in to a humongous shit storm of catastrophe and death, because I do tend to enjoy films like “Very Bad Things” that are about people with endlessly bad luck all because of one simple mistake. As far as premises go, “Adam’s Jacket” can be enticing, it’s just sad that it’s not very watchable.